Running Tired
by Herringway
Summary: Sometimes she lies awake at night, lost in thought.


_"If we're never together, if I'm never back again, well I swear to God that I'll love you forever." - Pints of Guinness Make You Strong, by Against Me!_

It never feels that long ago, she shivers. The memories come rushing full force and, in the privacy of her bedroom, she cries into her pillow. She holds her favorite blue cushion to her chest, taking in his scent. He had gotten this for her after one of their fights, and she knew she couldn't stay mad at him after that. This pillow sometimes took his place when he was away at work, unable to console her in her times of grief. This is one such night.

Some days she's floored by how this all came to be. She can't process it, her brain refuses to cooperate and she lays back down on the floor, arms spread out, and she stares a hole through her ceiling. It's a gaze so intense, that she swears she can see the night sky through the gray ceiling above her, past the raindrops that remind her of the picnic she had with him, and their armless friend.

She glances over at the prothetic running legs propped up haphazardly in the corner. She should go for a run, she muses for a moment. Since that day she hasn't run as much as she used to. It used to be something they did together. She had been doing it long before she knew him, true, but at the time, it was for another purpose. Running was the only way she felt alive, but it's not so much the same anymore, though she does miss the smell of wind in her face as one leg would hit the track, followed by the next, and so on, at the track at Yamaku.

Yes, she does miss that.

Sometimes she waits for him, in the kitchen/dining room of their apartment. Here, she has a good view of the porch area, where she can greet him after a hard day's work. He managed to get a job as a theoretical physicist, and his work consumed him some nights. He still made time for family, of course. They'd go for runs in the evening (or walks sometimes, though to her those were less fun), and upon returning home, they'd take a shower, usually together, both to conserve hot water and to indulge in a little intimacy.

She sighs shakily, wishing to feel him with her, against her, _inside _her. Yes, those were the days.

She looks to a black alarm clock on the nighttable, and sits up to get a better look at the time. She squints past her tears, and barely makes out the red numbers that tell her it's three forty-two in the morning.

He isn't coming home tonight. She knows this. He'll never be home. He's out tonight, and he's never coming home. He shares a living space with her father now, in the cemetery. Their plots are right next to each other. It's been a while since the heart attack that did him in.

She holds the pillow close to her face again, to take in his scent, wondering where she gets the strength to get through the day without him.

The two most important men in her life were taken from her. She wonders what she has to live for now. She starts to cry, and prays to a God that she never believed in to help her find the strength to deal with this.

And there, in the quiet of the night, she remembers. She can see him now, shaking his head despondently at her, silently repremanding her for what she's about to become, because he knows that she's better than this. And so does she. She sniffles, and she gets up from the floor. She glances once, only once, at a picture that was taken of the two of them after a mixed 400M sprint.

She's positively brimming, holding the gold medal above her head with a childish glee. His hair is the same mess it's always been, and he's showing signs of tiredness, cluthing a bottle of water in one hand, and showing off his bronze medal with the other. She remembers when he started running, and the comparison between the boy and the man is astounding.

She smiles fondly at the memory. He kissed her afterwards, and they decided to go to dinner to celebrate. After a shower, of course. But before she can run away, he stops her, and drops to a knee, and it was there where he asked for her hand. The diamond was small, but she didn't care. She had never been happier in her life.

Tomorrow, she decides, she'll wake up early. With new resolve, she'll go for a run again. She makes this a silent promise to his spirit, and to herself. And she never breaks her promises.

She'll run, and she won't stop, until she's with him again.


End file.
